I bought my 92, 500E with 195K on the clock. It was advertised on the forum by Captruff and being sold by Cannoli (Thanks guys, I love this car) - The car was in very good condition with a pile of service records and I have been very pleased with my purchase. This car did have a replacement transmission in it and Cannoli graciously included the original transmission in the deal, in case I wanted to repair it and keep the car numbers matching. I figured some day that would happen ... well in the spring this year the replacement tranny died and some day was upon me. I did a bunch of reading on the forum and called Captruff to see if there was anyone in the Seattle area that he would recommend to do the rebuild as I was hoping to keep the work at a local shop. He did give me some contacts, I talked with them and after my research I decided to use Marc at Sun Valley Mercedes Transmissions, LLC (SVMT) to do the rebuild.
My decision was influenced by Gerry's write up of his visit to Sun Valley Mercedes and the fact that Marc has a test bench set up he uses to run in and test a freshly rebuilt gearbox before sending it to the customer. No one in the local area had that level of equipment. The price that Marc charges was also a big factor, with shipping back to my shop was $1925.00 with a two year warranty. This was a very good price. I talked with Marc on the phone about his process. He assured me he goes through the transmission replacing anything that is out of factory specification including rebuilding the torque converter. He took his time with me and answered all my questions. I was pretty convinced he would do a good job and return my gearbox in the best possible condition. I strapped the gearbox to a pallet per Marc's instructions and included the shipping documents that he emailed to me. I called Marc a couple of days later and he let me know the pallet arrived and they would get it in the schedule for rebuild.
Now usually the customer is simply looking for a replacement gearbox and Marc ships the rebuilt replacement gearbox from his inventory and the customer has it installed and returns the core to SVMT. This process usually takes about a week maybe two and the customer is back on the road. Since I wanted my particular gearbox with it's SS number back the process took a bit longer. This is understandable as the rebuild has to be fit into the shops schedule of work and they were busy. The lead time was not unreasonable and I was in touch with Marc a couple of times during the wait. On one of the calls Marc let me know the rebuild was in process and informed me that the tranny I sent him was actually missing the valve body but he would not charge me any extra.
I was very pleased with that as an upcharge to replace that missing component would not have been out of line. The gearbox arrived back at my shop packaged in a box to protect it from the shipping gorillas with return shipping documents for the core. In my case I didn't have to return a core but I am sending him the dead gearbox anyway so it can be put to good use and make up for the missing valve body. I had the rebuilt transmission installed and have been driving the car for two days now and it drives great. The shifting is smooth and the car feels brand new. I would recommend Sun Valley Mercedes Transmissions to anyone looking for a replacement gearbox or to have a transmission rebuilt. Marc is excellent to work with and I am a very happy customer. I also extend big thanks to all the members of the 500E board for all the information they share. It is invaluable for a 500E NOOB and also provides hours of entertainment.
Thanks & and Cheers to all,
Boxersix
My decision was influenced by Gerry's write up of his visit to Sun Valley Mercedes and the fact that Marc has a test bench set up he uses to run in and test a freshly rebuilt gearbox before sending it to the customer. No one in the local area had that level of equipment. The price that Marc charges was also a big factor, with shipping back to my shop was $1925.00 with a two year warranty. This was a very good price. I talked with Marc on the phone about his process. He assured me he goes through the transmission replacing anything that is out of factory specification including rebuilding the torque converter. He took his time with me and answered all my questions. I was pretty convinced he would do a good job and return my gearbox in the best possible condition. I strapped the gearbox to a pallet per Marc's instructions and included the shipping documents that he emailed to me. I called Marc a couple of days later and he let me know the pallet arrived and they would get it in the schedule for rebuild.
Now usually the customer is simply looking for a replacement gearbox and Marc ships the rebuilt replacement gearbox from his inventory and the customer has it installed and returns the core to SVMT. This process usually takes about a week maybe two and the customer is back on the road. Since I wanted my particular gearbox with it's SS number back the process took a bit longer. This is understandable as the rebuild has to be fit into the shops schedule of work and they were busy. The lead time was not unreasonable and I was in touch with Marc a couple of times during the wait. On one of the calls Marc let me know the rebuild was in process and informed me that the tranny I sent him was actually missing the valve body but he would not charge me any extra.
I was very pleased with that as an upcharge to replace that missing component would not have been out of line. The gearbox arrived back at my shop packaged in a box to protect it from the shipping gorillas with return shipping documents for the core. In my case I didn't have to return a core but I am sending him the dead gearbox anyway so it can be put to good use and make up for the missing valve body. I had the rebuilt transmission installed and have been driving the car for two days now and it drives great. The shifting is smooth and the car feels brand new. I would recommend Sun Valley Mercedes Transmissions to anyone looking for a replacement gearbox or to have a transmission rebuilt. Marc is excellent to work with and I am a very happy customer. I also extend big thanks to all the members of the 500E board for all the information they share. It is invaluable for a 500E NOOB and also provides hours of entertainment.
Thanks & and Cheers to all,
Boxersix
neil
